regulation of a much less robust standard than was once common in professional and public life (a standard that the media have repeatedly criticised as grossly inadequate). It does not seem likely that the media have


such exceptional probity that they, unlike others, can effectively regulate themselves. However, at this point arguments about press freedom are usually invoked. Wouldn’t statu- tory media regulation be even worse than the PCC? Would we not end up with politicians regulating the media, suppressing what it suited them to suppress, leaving us with cen- sorship rather than a free press? Repeatedly we hear claims that regulation would under- mine or end press freedom. I think these claims are false, indeed sometimes mildly hysterical (not to mention self-serving), and that press freedom is compatible with, and often best protected by, regulation of the right sort. If we want some evidence that regulation can be compatible with press freedom, we need look no further than the BBC, which is quite stringently regulated yet whose jour- nalism has rather a high reputation for independence. Of course, bad regulation, or regulation done by politicians, would be risky. But there is no reason to settle for bad regu - lation, let alone to let politicians regulate. Setting up regulators indeed needs legislation, but regulators and their operational decisions can be well insulated from political and party concerns. In any case, the best arguments for press freedom do not support self-regulation. During the last 50 years, press freedom has increasingly been seen as a matter of freedom of expression. Freedom of expression for indi- viduals is a classical liberal demand, advocated above all by John Stuart Mill, whose On Libertydemands protection for self-regarding (today we would say self-affecting) speech that harms no others. Here, freedom of expres- sion for individuals is justified on the grounds that it is harmless and innocuous. In the


between sharp practice and illegality when chasing stories that hopefully were in the public interest but which invariably interested the public. One example of this was a story published


by The People under my editorship. When the then National Heritage Minister, David Mellor – already nicknamed the “Minister for Fun” by the fourth estate – embarked upon an extra-marital affair with a fledgling actress, tape recordings of their telephone conversations were brought to The People by a “friend”. The bugging of a private telephone was most certainly illegal, but in this case not so: he owned the premises where the clandestine relationship was regularly being consummated. It was his telephone. The content of the taped conversations established, to me, that the story was in the public interest: work and play had become dangerously entwined for the minister. So The People published the story – and gritted its teeth when the Establishment turned upon it with venom. Demands for more stringent


twentieth century, especially in the post-war human rights declarations, freedom of expres- sion was extended and became the default speech right not only for individuals, but for the press. Yet media speech is controlled by powerful organisations, and it is evidently not always innocuous. News International is not really in the business of self-expression. A more plausible view of media freedom would, in my view, anchor it not in supposed rights of self-expression for media organisa- tions, but in the fact that citizens in democracies need media that communicate effectively with them by providing content that they can both understand and assess. The News of the World was intelligible to its readers, but its clandestine activities prevented readers from assessing what they were told. Readers were not given means or evidence to judge whether to trust or mistrust what they read. They could not tell when they were reading material obtained by illegal means, often by targeting vulnerable people. Effective communication requires media that treat readers, listeners and viewers with greater respect, by providing them with the information and evidence by which to assess content and judge where to place and where to withhold trust. Much can be achieved by regulating media process rather than media content. Indeed, we already have quite a lot of pertinent legislation and regulation: phone hacking and corrupting police officers were already criminal offences. But this regulation was not effective. More


effective regulation –perhaps undertaken by a new division of Ofcom – could help the public to judge where to place and refuse trust with greater discrimination by regulating media process. Such a regulator might be expressly prevented from controlling content, and would not be a censor. Much regulation of media process could


be done cheaply, online. For example, declar - ations of interest by journalists, editors and


regulation of the press crowded the airwaves and filled columns in rival newspapers. After being interviewed – probingly but fairly – for BBC TV’s Newsnight by Jeremy Paxman, I was warned by him that I was in for a rough ride from the public. But it was against Mellor that the public


railed, especially after he released cosy family pictures in an effort to show what a decent chap he really was. The establishment clam- our quickly faded. Following another swim in the soup, when it emerged that he had taken a holiday paid for by Mona Bauwens, a daughter of a Palestine Liberation Organisation official, Mellor resigned and scuttled out of politics. I tell the story to illustrate that the percep- tion of “public interest” is not necessarily that held by those anxious to muzzle the media, or of lawyers itching to employ injunctions behind which miscreant clients can shelter. But there is a postscript: almost before the ink had dried on The People’s front page revealing the first scandal, the paper was


proprietors could be made available online (as for others in positions of influence): otherwise City reporters may puff the shares they own, and “property correspondents” extol the “bargains” in their own neighbourhoods. Online information could list any sum paid to informants to obtain a particular story (while retaining provision for protecting the identity of “sources”). A regulator could require these payments to be made explicit in com- pany accounts. Information about


the


qualifications or experience of those writing on technical subjects and links to relevant evidence could be provided online. The media have generally been keen to insist on the merits of transparency for others with power or influ- ence, and what is sauce for the goose is surely sauce for the gander. Of course, transparency will not be enough


to secure adequate media process, and there are other types of accountability that a regu - lator could require. We may also need to revisit the limited and clumsy form of privacy pro- tection afforded by the Data Protection Act. Correction of false and misleading reporting, in particular of non-trivial and damaging false reporting, could be made routine, given greater prominence and made more costly for the media than the PCC has chosen to make it.


Rights of reply for members of the public could be required, and prevented from focus- ing on trivial at the expense of serious matters. Indications of genre – news or infotainment; parody or report; editorial or advertisement – could be required. Accountability for others with power and influence is (rightly) a favourite media theme, but not something from which the media themselves should be exempt.


■Baroness O’Neill of Bengarve is a professor of philosophy at Cambridge University. She gave the BBC Reith Lectures in 2002 on “A Question of Trust”.


accused of having tampered with the record- ing device by entering the house where Mellor’s mistress was ensconced. My news- desk hotly denied the claim and I refuted it equally so. Only much later did I discover that an over-enthusiastic reporter had ignored instructions and indeed entered the property, therefore trespassing and jeopardising the entire exercise. Yes, editors do not always know exactly what their journalists are up to.


This was, of course, small beer compared to the serial law-breaking initially exposed after, in November 2005, the News of the World published a story about a knee injury suffered by Prince William, prompting fears that the voicemail messages of an aide were being intercepted. By then press excesses – mainly but not exclusively by the red-top tabloids – had begun seriously to irritate not just the great and the not-so-good but also a public perhaps jaded by traditional media. Also, the web and its offspring – Google, (Continued on page 8.)


16 July 2011 | THE TABLET | 7


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